I just had a brief question for any of my readers out there who may care to respond.
I was checking the news wire tonight, and I read a story that politicians in Washington are going to create jobs…
If we go back in history, other than hiring workers to work for the government itself, or by adding to the military.
During the Great Depression of the 1930’s, the government went through a lot of efforts to stimulate employment.

What was the The Works Progress Administration (renamed during 1939 as the Work Projects Administration; WPA) was the largest New Deal agency, employing millions to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media and literacy projects. It fed children and redistributed food, clothing and housing. Almost every community in the United States had a park, bridge or school constructed by the agency, which especially benefited rural and Western populations. Expenditures from 1936 to 1939 totaled nearly $7 billion.[1]

Created by order of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the WPA was funded by Congress with passage of the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act of 1935 on April 8, 1935. The legislation had passed in the House of Representatives by a margin of 329 to 78, but was delayed by the Senate.[1]

The WPA continued and extended relief programs similar to the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC), which was established by Congress in 1932 during the administration of Roosevelt’s predecessor Herbert Hoover. Headed by Harry Hopkins, the WPA provided jobs and income to the unemployed during the Great Depression in the United States. Between 1935 and 1943, the WPA provided almost eight million jobs.[2]

Until ended by Congress and war employment during 1943, the WPA was the largest employer in the country. Most people who needed a job were eligible for at least some of its jobs.[3] Hourly wages were the prevailing wages in each area; the rules said workers could not work more than 30 hours a week, but many projects included months in the field, with workers eating and sleeping on worksites. Before 1940, there was some training involved to teach new skills and the project’s original legislation had a strong emphasis on training.

Civilian Conservation Corps of 1933 This employed jobless single men between the ages of 18 and 25. They worked for 6 months in mountains and forests where they were taught forestry, flood control and fire prevention. Nearly 3 million men took part in the scheme which ran from 1933 to 1941.

Works Progress Administration of 1935 The WPA coordinated all public works schemes. It spent over $10.5 billion of Federal money and employed 3.8 million men from 1935 to 1941. It had built 77,000 bridges, 24,000 miles of sewers, 664,000 miles of road, 285 airports, 122,000 public buildings and 11,000 schools.

Reconstruction Finance Corporation This agency loaned money to state and local governments to assist the poor. It also lent money to firms which were in debt or wanted to invest.

Farm Credit Administration This agency used Federal money to pay off farm creditors and save farmers from bankruptcy.

Home Owners Loan Corporation 1933 This agency used Federal money to pay of mortgages so that home owners did not lose their homes.

The agencies which were enacted then may give us a good idea as to what awaits us. After all, If the government will be the generator of jobs, not the private sector, then the government needs to get cracking? right….
Emergency Banking Act 1933

The Federal government insured people’s deposits in banks against losses caused by public panic. This helped restore the public confidence in the nation’s banking system

National Industrial Recovery Act ’33
This act had three parts to it. It set up the Public Works Administration (PWA) to manage public works projects; The PWA spent $7 billion and employed millions of men.

It set up the National Recovery Administration to set up codes of practices for such things as hours worked, wages, unfair competition and outlawing child labour. 16 million workers were covered by these code and child labour was outlawed. Workers went on to a 8 hours week and a minimum wage of $1.25 was introduced.

The third strand of the NIRA was to give trade unions the legal right to bargain with employers. Membership of trade unions increased after the introduction of this act.

NIRA was declared unconstitutional in 1935.

Agricultural Adjustment Act 1933 This act paid farmers to limit the amount of crops they grew or simply to dig back into the ground crops already grown. The federal government bought farm animals and then slaughtered then to raise the price of farm products.

Between 1933 and 1937, farm prices doubled but in 1936 the AAA was declared unconstitutional.

Tennessee Valley Development Act ’33 This set up the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). Its sole task was to re-develop the Tennessee Valley which encompassed 7 states and 40,000 square miles.
HEP stations were built, flood control was introduced as was soil conservation. The valley was regenerated.

National Labour Relations Act ’35 This act forced employers to deal with trade unions. Workers were also given the right to form and join trade unions and to take part in collective bargaining. A board was set up to investigate and punish those companies bosses who did not abide by the rules of the NLRA.
In 1935 trade union membership stood at 3.6 million. By 1941 it was 8.6 million. In 1935 the CIO (Congress of Industrial Organisations) came into being.

Social Security Act 1935 This act set up the first national old age pensions scheme. Workers and employers had to pay into a federal pension fund. Each state was also expected to work out a plan for unemployment insurance.

This one act covered 35 million people despite opposition from Republicans who felt the whole idea smacked of socialism.

Soil Conservation Act 1936 The federal government paid subsidies to farmers who agreed to leave land fallow or planted crops that put nitrogen back into the soil. The federal government also financed research into soil conservation.

Fair Labour Standards Act 1938 The FLSA sort to cut the maximum hours someone could work and to raise the minimum wage for those who worked in inter-state trade.
This act gave protection to over 13 million people. It introduced a 40 hour week and a minimum wage of 40 cents an hour.

Agricultural Adjustment Act 1938 The act introduced the Federal government subsidising the price of many farm products. The aim was to gradually increase the subsidy until farm prices reached their pre-1914 figure to give all farmers a guaranteed minimum income

As we head into 2010, all the writing on the walls is that we are moving back towards these types of programs. When Washington says it wants to create jobs, then if history is a teacher, programs like these, or similar programs with the same goals, are what we can look forward towards.

Of course, the majority of these programs, except for the FDIC, anti-child labor, the 40 hour work week and the minimum wage, all of the rest were declared unconstitutional. But that fact would not prevent a version of them re-surfacing under a new name. And since it would take several years for the US Supreme Court to rule again on these matters, there wouldn’t be anything really stopping the more socialist of our lawmakers getting on this band wagon.

The fact remains that there is a fundamental dis-connect between socialist lawmakers, who seem to dis-avow the record of such programs, long term whenever and wherever they were imposed in the rest of the world.

The failure of large scale socialism in Europe seems to be just ignored. There is an arrogance on the part of these people which borders on megalomania…. It seems to be they are saying, “well, our version will be perfected, after all, we all went to Harvard and Yale and Stanford…We can’t be wrong. History is wrong, not our policies..” IN other words… “Don’t bother me with the facts, my mind is made up.” Come hell or high water, these boys want a version of socialism, and that is what we are going to get.

The health care bill, is just the tip of the iceberg. Currently we are seeing limits set on the profitability of “targeted” industries. Today its the greedy bankers, but tomorrow it could be any other group which the politicians deem as being “too profitable”…

Why stop with banks? Hollywood just had one movie alone, Avatar, which looks like it will make at least 3BB….Perhaps James Cameron, the director, should be taxed for his success. After all, if it wasn’t for the fact he lived in the US, he couldn’t make those movies. Better yet, confiscate his personal wealth, and then have him make movies owned by the US Government. All profits would go towards what ever the ‘movie czar” thought would be best. And the Actors who make 20 million a movie, jut take those profits and use them for a better end. The actor’s salary couldn’t be more than the President, which is 400K.

I wonder if Barbara Streisand would be willing to give up all of her personal wealth, gained at the expense of her fan base over the past 50 years. After all, if she didn’t live in the US, she couldn’t have been so successful… I wonder how many 100k dinner fundraisers she’d be doing for the Dem’s then….

Then we have the target(s) of professional sports… Golfers making 10million? How about Tiger.. Does any one person really need 1BB? Make him give it all back to the country… NFL franchise owners? From now on, by federal decree, ticket prices can not be higher than ten bucks, after all, if the “common man” can’t take his family to a game, shouldn’t that be fixed by Washington, DC? I mean come on, we need a salary CZAR for Hollywood, One for the NFL, one for the NBA, MLB, you name it.. And the owners? Forget about it. confiscate their ownership. pure and simple, no one should own a business that makes more the 400K a year, right? .. Again, no one makes more than 400K a year…Because someone in Washington is about making it all equal. Making it all “fair” according to their own personal calculus…

You see people, once this ball gets rolling, there’s no stopping it… Every one in America hates the top 1percent. or the top .000001 percent. The voters are all for it, so lets do it? Right… Oh and don’t forget the talking heads on CNN, I wonder how long it would take Keith Obermeir or Katie Couric to flip sides if their salary went from millions a year to 400K.. After all, couldn’t all their extra money be put to better use? If it would be OK to go after Rush Limbaugh, it would have to be OK to go after Al Franken.. Turn about is fair play, right?

Just think, the national debt could be retired, and we could all live like characters on Star Trek. The Federation would be there from Birth to Death…. Don’t laugh.. Its what some in this country really dream of and right now, they are trying to get the ball rolling down that slippery, slippery slope.

This is hyperbole and sarcasm for those readers who are too dense to realize that I am using this as an example. But sooner or later, once we start targeting groups for special taxes, Super successful people will go to another country where they will be left alone.

That’s why most of our ancestors got on boats and got the hell out of 17th, 18th and 19th century Europe. Europe was stifling…. Europe had no opportunity… must the USA follow the path of Post WWII Europe? Must we???? Those on the left in this country would have us headed there, I fear….

Oh, and by the way, don’t write and tell me that your ancestors were African and had no choice but to be on the slavery boats. I watched Oprah, I saw Amistaad. I know that the song Amazing Grace was written by a slave ship captain who had a revelation that his job and live were vile and wretched, as was the practice of slavery… OK???? . I realize that was the case. I realize slavery was bad. We already fought a war over that issue, and since I have been alive, since 1966, I witnessed the Civil Right’s movement. So please don’t email me and lecture me about modern US history.

Any how, we should all rest easier because our politicians in Washington, DC are going to create the new jobs for the US in 2010. So sweet dreams, America.